Impromptu Star Party Report for October 23, 2025

[Ernie Morse]

Hi all,

Five HAL members attended an impromptu star party at Alpha Ridge Park on October 23, 2025.  Skies were clear all night and the weather was fine, although seeing and transparency were both subpar.

Welcome to Bruce and Neil, two new members who were attending their first impromptu event!  Both of them were imaging comet Lemmon with DSLR camera setups.  Shrikant also imaged Lemmon with a DSLR camera and his 72 mm Astro-Tech refractor, and I think he also got in some imaging of comet SWAN.

Sundar was making visual observations with his Celestron 130 mm Newtonian and taking some images with his Pixel 8 in astrophotography mode on a tripod.  He reached a personal milestone in finding the Andromeda galaxy with the telescope and getting an image of it with his phone camera through the eyepiece.  Congratulations!

I observed three double stars (h 5188 in Sagittarius, 15 Aquilae and 94 Aquarii), the Wild Duck cluster (M11) and five Messier globular clusters (M2, M15, M56, M71 and M92).  Comet SWAN was right between M11 and M2, so I should've taken a look at that while I was in the area, but it didn't occur to me because I was locked in globular mode.  These observations were with my Celestron 8" Starsense Explorer Dob.  I also finished up my multi-night imaging of the Heart Nebula with my Vespera II EAA scope.

I closed up HALO and the park and left at 11:05 PM.

Ernie